Small plane crashes in Baltic Sea near Ventspils; no survivors found so far

RIGA - A small plane crashed in the Baltic Sea near Ventspils Sunday evening, rescuers have so far not found a single survivor, head of the Maritime Search and Rescue Coordination Center of the National Armed Forces Peteris Subbota told TV3 Monday morning.

Search continued throughout the night, but only one piece of aircraft wreckage was spotted in the sea, which could be related to the crash.

Subbota said that, according to information available to the rescuers, there were four people on board the plane, but communications with the aircraft had been lost for a long time before it crashed.

According to Flightradar information, an Austrian private jet crashed in the Baltic Sea near Ventspils.

Spanish newspaper El Pais reports that the plane belonged to a German family.

REUTERS reports that the Austrian-registered Cessna 551 aircraft was flying from Jerez in southern Spain, from where it took off at 3:56 p.m. Latvian time without a set destination.

It turned twice, at Paris and Cologne, before heading straight out over the Baltic, passing near the Swedish island of Gotland. At 8:37 p.m. it was listed on the flight tracker as rapidly losing speed and altitude.